Nic Sellars and Tom Briggs have just returned from a trad climbing trip in the states where amongst other things they made the 2nd ascent of a classic Peter Croft route called Airstream. Nic sent in this report.

"Just got back to Blighty after a fab month long trip to the states to climb in the High Sierras on an Alpine rock trip. Tom Briggs and I managed to make the 2nd ascent of Airsteam, a 12 pitch Peter Croft route on a crag called The Incredible Hulk. The route comprised numerous pitches of 5.11 (E4 ish) up to the crux pitches of 512c (7b+), 513b (7c+), 512c. We managed to on-sight all pitches except the crux pitch which managed to squeeze in all it's difficulty into about 15 ft of slippery groove technical shinaniggins. I red-pointed this by the skin of my teeth as I was fairly trashed by the climb up to this point. All in all we took 12 hours from bivvi to bivvi. The next day we quested down to a very hot and sweaty Bishop to contratulate Peter on his route with some beers (and meet up with a real US role model). Hope the photo attachment arrives in a useable state."

Looking for some HULK topos as well and perhaps a partner (mine just got injured) Anyone got topos for Eye of the Storm or Astro Hulk. I'd love to do Venturi Effect and try Airstream. Will be there starting Aug 15th.

Werner's kinda right, especially on the Hulk. If you go up there, you'll see cracks and corners running bottom to top...they're all equipped at this point, choose the nicest looking line and head up, and as mentioned, its all in the new version of the fine literary guidebook from Secor, no topos allowed. But there's a picture with the lines drawn in...it looks like a picture without the lines drawn in.

The COD and I did a link-up of Trade Winds (the first five pitches) to Astro Hulk and it was really fun! This was in order to avoid the 5.12 pitches on Trade Winds because I'm not a 5.12 climber. Our link-up was a good alternative to Positive Vibes for 5.11 climbers, although there was quite a bit of kitty litter and runout at the top of Astro Hulk so fledgling 5.11 leaders (like me) would be a bit spooked. The COD called it "heady" but had no trouble with it, and I found it fun to follow.

On the topo we had, there was a fixed piton on a 5.10 section of Astro Hulk, which I did encounter while leading the pitch. However, it fell out in my hand when I clipped it so it's not there any more! Luckily, that section was well-protected by a blue alien.

On the FA of Positive Vibration, we got up to the terrace by going up the third class below the Red Dihedral, stepping over onto Tradewinds at around P2, and following that line up to the terrace to access the upper pitches.

We initially did that start in '77, when we did a route that follows Astrohulk above the terrace for several pitches, but near the top we pendulumed left into a left facing dihedral (visible in Cultureshock's first image, just below the skyline, left of the last pitch of Astohulk). We supposed that Greg Donaldson's party, on the very first ascent of the wall, started as per the standard start to PV, did a few pitches on Astrohulk, then swung to the right and eventually finished up near the top of the Red Dihedral. This inference is based on Donaldson's description and the fact that we found a sling set up for a pendulum on Astrohulk a few pitches above the terrace.

Also, on the FA of Polish Route, we rapped off the back after we reached the ridge. Brutus and Pat Brennan finished it to the summit years later. That's a good long route.